More than 50 vendors, including Headline Books of Terra Alta, registered for the annual Gift Buyers Marketplace Feb. 4-6 at Pipestem Resort State Park.
This trade show for gift and souvenir buyers is an annual event that brings together buyers from attractions, state parks and retail shops looking for new souvenir, novelty items, and gift-type items for retail sales. The Marketplace features items ranging from books, shirts and caps, wood works, novelty items, and apparel, to West Virginia products.
Seven featured authors attending the Marketplace are Lynn Salsi, Melinda Chambers, Anne Beatty, Mary Jane Romig, Patsy Pittman, Randall Sanger and Marcie May.
In Salsi’s Jack & The Giants multi-headed giants block Jack’s attempts to earn his fortune. He outwits the entire giant family in a unique and humorous fashion. This is another tale in the ancient American Jack Tale cycle. Salsi, a known interpreter of American folklore and Pulitzer Prize nominee, retells the story with magical twists and turns that are matched by James Young’s dynamic illustrations. It is a Mom’s Choice Awards Silver honoree. The Mom’s Choice Awards® is an awards program that recognizes authors, inventors, companies, parents and others for their efforts in creating quality family-friendly media, products and services.
Chambers holds four prestigious Mom’s Choice Awards for her children’s books. Her newest title, And We Helped!, won Silver for children’s picture books about cooking and food. It is written with her grandchildren and illustrated with photos of them baking together. In the category of Best Children’s Books—Values & Life Lessons Chambers’ books, We Are Whooo We Are and Fraidy Cat, won Gold, and The Day The Snapdragons Snapped Back, won the Silver Award. Chambers is regularly a featured author at Book Expo America in New York.
Beatty’s novel, Please Forgive Me explores forgiveness. A dying woman’s last words turn Cassie Buchanan’s world upside down. Her lifelong friends and her husband surround her after as she tries to accept her past as a lie and start her future as the unknown for a new beginning. James and Caroline Mayfield had lived for thirty-seven years never knowing their only child, Emily Mayfield, who was kidnapped at birth and taken from her rightful parents. A kidnapping and murder of many innocent people led to an emotional journey of learning to forgive in order to lead a life of normalcy instead of being consumed with hatred.
Romig, a retired public school educator, wrote Grandfather’s Garden, a humorous first reader and mystery for children in Pre-K through third grade. Readers seek rabbits hiding among the richly colored fruits and vegetables on every page. The book has extra pages of healthy recipes and a kid-friendly food pyramid. The Mom’s Choice Awards gave it Silver for Best Children’s Picture Book – Humor.
Pittman will sign Pocket Change, her newest collection of short stories, and Blood Kin & Other Strangers, which was named an Award Winning Finalist in the USA Book News Best Books Awards and an Award Winning Finalist in the Indie Book Awards.
Sanger’s book with Ed Rehbein, West Virginia Waterfalls: The New River Gorge, was named a Finalist in the Photography: Nature category of the THE 2011 INTERNATIONAL BOOK AWARDS. It has a pull-out hiking guide to lead you to experience up close the beautiful waterfalls in the photos.
In Penny & Tubs by Marcie May and Margaret Zerhusen, the title characters dream about an adventure to the City on the Sea, where they discover an imaginary world of floating homes and underwater playgrounds. They learn how different people live and make new friends. Penny and Tubs Adventure books and music are created to stimulate and encourage children to want to read.
These and other Headline Books titles are available at local and online bookstores.
